White South Africans arrive to us under Trump Refugee Plan

A group of 59 white South Africans arrive in the United States, where they are granted refugee status.

President Donald Trump said the country's African minority refugee applications were swiftly accelerated as they were victims of “racism.”

The South African government said the group did not suffer from persecution that deserves refugee status.

The Trump administration has suspended all other refugee hospitalizations, including applicants from Wauzon. Human Rights Watch describes the move as a cruel racial twist, saying thousands of people (many black people and Afghan refugees) have been denied shelter by the United States.

A group of white South Africans who landed at Dulles Airport near Washington, D.C. on Monday received a warm welcome from US authorities.

She hugged young children in the arrival area decorated with red, white and blue balloons on the wall and waved a small American flag.

Refugees in the US take months and even years to process, but the group is being tracked quickly. UNHCR – United Nations Refugee Agency – As usual, we checked with the BBC, which were not involved in the review.

Asked directly on Monday why African asylum applications were processed faster than other groups, Trump said there was a “genocide” and that “white farmers” were specifically targeted.

“The farmers are being killed, they happen to be white, but it's no different to me whether they're white or black.”

However, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa told Trump during the call that his assessment of the situation in the US was “not true.”

“Refugees are those who have to exclude their country from fears of political persecution, religious persecution or economic persecution,” Ramaphosa said. “And they don't fit that bill.”

In response to a question from the BBC at Dulles Airport, Secretary of State Christopher Landau said:

The US has criticised South Africa's policies within the country, accusing the government of seizing land from white farmers without compensation.

In January, President Ramaphosa signed a controversial law that would allow the government to seize privately owned land without compensation in certain circumstances, if it is deemed “fair and public interest.”

However, the government has said that the land has not yet been seized under the law.

In the 30 years since the end of the racist apartheid system, there have been complaints in South Africa at a slow pace of land reform.

According to a 2017 report, Black people make up more than 90% of the population, but only hold 4% of privately owned land.

One of Trump's closest advisers, South African-born Elon Musk, previously said there was a “white genocide” in South Africa and accused the government of passing “racist ownership laws.”

White genocide claims are widely held.

In a statement to the BBC, Gregory Meek is ranked as a Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee and said that Trump administration's refugee resettlement is “a politically motivated rewrite of history, not just a racist dog whip.”

The Church of Episcopal said it would not cooperate with the federal government on refugee settlements due to the “incentives” granted to Africans.

Commenting on this news about X, Vice Chairman JD Vance posted “Crazy.”

Melissa Keeney, an attorney for the International Refugee Assistance Project, told the BBC that the White House's decision to quickly track African arrivals amounts to “a lot of hypocrisy and unequal treatment.”

Her organization is suing the Trump administration after indefinitely suspending the US Refugee Enrollment Program (USRAP) in January. She said the policy left Limbo with more than 120,000 conditionally approved refugees.

African author Max du Please told the BBC's Newsday Radio program that the allegations of persecution of white South Africans are “completely absurd” and “nothing.”

South African police figures show that in 2024, 44 murders were recorded on small plots of farms and farmland, with eight of them killing farmers.

Although South Africa does not report crime statistics classified by race, the majority of farmers in the country are white, while the rest of the farms, such as workers, are mostly black.

Bilateral relations between the US and South Africa have been strained ever since resettling the Africanars, a group with a predominantly Dutch ancestor in the US, and first appointed a government.

In March, US ambassador to South Africa, Ebrahim Lasor was banished after accusing President Trump of using “white victims as dog whispers,” and accused Lasor of “racial baiting.”

The US has also criticized South Africa in the International Court of Justice (ICJ) for taking a “aggressive” position against Israel, with Pretoria criticizing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's genocide government against the Palestinians – the Israelis strongly rejected.

President Trump's openness to accepting African refugees is because the United States is engaged in a wider crackdown on immigrants and asylum seekers from other countries.

Additional reports by Khanyisile Ngcobo in Johannesburg and Cai Pigliucci in Washington, DC